Novice nurses offer ‘Band-Aid fix’

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This article was published 18/11/2021 (1561 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Exhausted nurses are skeptical about the rollout of a new paid mentorship program for undergraduate students in their field, citing concerns about mentee safety, ballooning workloads and quality patient care.

Earlier this week, Manitoba unveiled the undergraduate nurse employee program: an initiative that will provide third- and fourth-year nursing students with paid shifts in hospitals under supervisors to both help them gain experience and assist with a chronic labour shortage.

With many logistics still under wraps, one registered nurse said he has “many significant concerns” about how the program will affect everyone involved.

The health-care professional, who asked he not be named to protect his job, said he and his colleagues would welcome the opportunity to provide students with a fulfilling educational experience — if there was enough capacity to do so.

“This sounds really like a Band-Aid fix. The short-term solution is not to shove people who are under-trained into the field. We need more money going toward retention efforts, education and keeping people in the field,” said the nurse, who works at the Health Sciences Centre in Winnipeg.

He raised concerns about the responsibilities of clinical practicum instructors being shuffled to working nurses, hospitals not having enough areas with “stable” staffing to accommodate students in surgery, medicine and mental health units, and employers counting trainees towards staffing ratios.

A spokesperson for Shared Health said unit managers will determine if a student nurse is suitable for their ward to ensure it will be beneficial for both the student and staff, without affecting safe patient care.

“As units are identified, conversations will occur with nurses on the unit which may be appropriate for these new positions,” wrote the spokesperson via email, adding there will be considerations about students’ skills and the support they require, as well as patient care assignments.

Following the announcement Monday, Darlene Jackson of the Manitoba Nurses Union said the program’s success will hinge on a careful rollout that involves finding enough qualified mentors and lessening their workloads so they can support novice nurses.

A spokesperson for the MNU, who said there are “plenty of concerns” at present, echoed those comments in an email Wednesday.

“A thoughtful and careful rollout doesn’t appear to be happening, which is extremely worrying as throwing young and inexperienced nurses into the current state of affairs could even further advance our inability to recruit and retain nurses long-term,” wrote Brandi Johnson, communications manager at MNU.

The idea behind the program has merit, but employees need more details, said one long-time nurse based in Winnipeg.

The nurse of 16 years added employers cannot discount the fact training young nurses puts more strain on the employees working in a ward.

The College of Registered Nurses of Manitoba indicated Wednesday these student nurses will be unregulated care providers, not unlike students who are on a clinical placement, who require supervision to apply requisite skills for safe client care, and will be accountable to their employer.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @macintoshmaggie